trines of a true religion and the means and arguments by which a virtuous man acquires an influence over the characters and conduct of his fellow creatures. When a man desires another to do any thing, that is the precept; when he enforces it by any mode of persuasion, that is the doctrine. When the Athenians were at war with the Heraclidæ, it was declared by the Oracle, that the nation whose king died first should be victorious in the contest. As soon as this was known, Codrus disguised himself, went over to the camp of the enemy, and exposed himself there to a quarrel with a soldier, who killed him without knowing who he was. The Athenians sent to demand the body of their king; which so alarmed the Heraclidæ, from the recollection of the Oracle, that they fled in disorder. Now, let us suppose that Codrus wished to inculcate the principle of patriotism in his countrymen. If he had merely issued a proclamation, commanding every citizen to prefer the interest of his country to his own life, he would have been giving them a moral precept, but without a corresponding doctrine. If he had joined to this. proclamation, the promise of honour and wealth as the rewards of obedience, he would have been adding a very powerful doctrine, yet nevertheless such a doctrine as must have led much more directly to patriotic conduct than to patriotic feeling and principle. Vanity and avarice, without patriotism, might have gained those rewards: But if he wished to excite or o cherish the principle of patriotism in the

hearts of his people, he chose the most eloquent and prevailing argument, when he sacrificed his life for them, and thus attracted their admiration and gratitude to that spirit which animated his breast, and their love to that country of which he was at once the representative and the ransom.

It is indeed a striking and yet an undeniable fact, that we are comparatively little affected by abstract truths in morality. The cry of a child will produce a greater movement, in almost any mind, than twenty- pages of unanswerable reasoning. An instinctive, acquaintance with this fact guides us in our dealings with our fellow creatures; and He who formed the heart of man, has attested his revealed word, by showing his acquaintance with the channel through which persuasion and instruction might be most effectually communicated. It may therefore be useful to illustrate, at greater length, the analogy which exists between the persuasions of the gospel, and those which might be fixed on as the most powerful arguments capable of being addressed to any human feelings on the subject of human in

terests.

Let us, then, present to ourselves a company of men travelling along the sea-shore. One of them, better acquainted with the ground than the rest, warns them of quicksands, and points out to them a landmark which indicated the position of a dangerous pass. They, however, see no great reason for apprehension; they are anxious to get forward, and cannot

resolve upon making a considerable circuit in order to avoid what appears to them an imaginary evil; they reject his counsel, and proceed onwards. In these circumstances, what argument ought he to use? What mode of persuasion can we imagine fitted to fasten on their minds a strong conviction of the reality of their danger and the disinterested benevolence of their adviser? His words have been ineffectual; he must try some other method; he must act. And he does so; for seeing no other way of prevailing on them, he desires them to wait only a single moment, till they see the truth of his warning confirmed by his fate. He goes before them; he puts his foot on the seemingly firm sand, and sinks to death. This eloquence is irresistible: He was the most active and vigorous amongst them; if any one I could have extricated himself from the difficulty, it was he; they are persuaded; they make the necessary circuit, bitterly accusing themselves of the death of their generous companion; and during their progress, as often as these landmarks occur, his nobleness and their own danger rise to their minds and secure their safety. Rashness is now not perilous merely, -it is ungrateful; it is making void the death of their deliverer.

To walk, without God in the world, is to walk in sin; and sin is the way of danger. Men had been told this by their own consciences, and they had even partially and occasionally believed it; but still they walked on. Common arguments had failed; the manifestations of the

Divine character in creation and providence, and the testimony of conscience, had been in a great measure disregarded: It thus seemed necessary that a stronger appeal should be made to their understanding and their feelings. The danger of sin must be more strikingly and unequivocally demonstrated; and the alarm excited by this demonstration must be connected with a more kindly and generous principle, which may bind their affections to that God from whom they have wandered. But how is this to be done? What more prevailing appeal can be made? Must the Almighty Warner demonstrate the evil of sin by undergoing its effects? Must he prove the danger of sin by exhibiting himself as a sufferer under its consequences ? Must he who knew no sin suffer as a sinner, that he might persuade men that sin is indeed an evil?-It was even so. God became man, and dwelt amongst us. encountered the terrors of guilt, and bore its punishment; and called on his careless creatures to consider and understand the evil of sin, by contemplating even its undeserved effects on a being of perfect purity, who was over all, God blessed for ever. Could they hope to sustain that weight which had crushed the Son of God? Could they rush into that guilt and that danger against which he had so pathetically warned them? Could they refuse their hearts and their obedience to him who had proved himself so worthy of their confidence? -especially when we consider that this great benefactor is ever present, and sees the ac

He himself

ceptance which this history of his compassion meets with in every breast, rejoicing in those whose spirits are purified by it, and still holding out the warning of his example to the most regardless.

Ancient history tells us of a certain king who made a law against adultery, in which it was enacted that the offender should be punished by the loss of both eyes. The very first offender was his own son. The case was most distressing; for the king was an affectionate father as well as a just magistrate. After much deliberation and inward struggle, he finally commanded one of his own eyes to be pulled out and one of his son's. It is easier to conceive than to describe what must have been the feelings of the son in these most affecting circumstances. His offence would appear to him in a new light; it would appear to him not simply as connected with painful consequences to himself, but as the cause of a father's sufferings and as an injury to a father's love. If the king had passed over the law altogether, in his son's favour, he would have exhibited no regard for justice, and he would have given a very inferior proof of affection. We measure affection by the sacrifice which it is prepared to make, and by the resistance which it overcomes. If the sacrifice had been made, and the resistance overcome secretly in the heart of the king, there could have been but little evidence of the real existence either of principle or of affection; and the son might perhaps have had reason to think, that his par